years later
by Ddischordia
Summary: HAS BEEN REWRITTEN AS "In the End"! Katara visits the Fire Palace for the first time in five years with a baby Tenzin in her arms. She finds that the man who lives there has changed beyond her understanding- or is she just denying the truth like she always has? Twoshot Zutara.
1. Katara

A: TLA does not belong to me, enjoy part 1, in Katara's pov. I'm not _super-duper_ happy with the pacing, but I'm tired of poking at it.

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><p>Aang ascends into the air after dropping me off in the back gardens of the palace, he has something urgent to attend to, and with a brand new child he simply can't afford to leave me alone at the air temple right now- or so I've convinced him. I watch him as he leaves- I know it's wrong when a heavy weight lifts off of my heart the further he is in the distance. Tenzin is only two weeks old, wrapped up snugly in my capable arms. He slept the whole trip, to my relief. Hopefully Zuko would have gotten my letter by now. I peered out into the yard, seeing no sign of him. Perhaps he hadn't read it yet after all, he was busier these days.<p>

I found that my mind wandered slowly to our shared past. We had written to each other a lot at first, but over time the letters came further and further apart. One day I realized that he had just stopped writing to me, so I shrugged my shoulders and let sleeping dogs lie. There was no real need to be in constant communication any more- but I remembered the last letter he'd sent me perfectly. Maybe I should have expected it, the way he implied that he was swamped with work and stress. It may have stuck out, but Zuko's distance had not been the only thing that had changed in six long years.

Toph occasionally had a note dictated to us, telling me about her adventures in the Earth kingdom and beyond. She took back her champion's belt and lived life as a quasi-hermit and vigilante, usually keeping her identity as the Avatar's earthbender a secret. Sokka and Suki had a child last year, after Suki moved permanently to the southern water tribe. They had named their baby Yui. My father had retired and Sokka became the tribe leader. I understood that he was scared of all that responsibility, but I was half a world away from all of them; I couldn't help take the burden off of his shoulders; it was a good thing that he had grown into the role with time.

Sometimes I woke up and I could hardly believe the time that had passed. When we had first splintered off, I rose in the morning still expecting to hear Toph bickering with somebody, expected Zuko to be off somewhere practicing his bending, even looking forward to Sokka's snoring. I also expected that dull nostalgia to fade over time, but it never did. In the first year it hadn't been so bad. We were all scrambling to stave off civil war, quell rebellions; it was as if our base had just relocated itself to Zuko's study. There were a lot of parties and meetings; we all became diplomats and delegates, united under the Avatar's banner. It took us all, working day and night to keep Zuko from losing his precarious grasp on the fire nation. The difference that year shifted from making peace to keeping it. It turns out that the divide between them isn't so wide after all. Toph had left first, eager to reclaim her title as the best bender in the earth kingdom, Sokka and Suki left to the Kyoshi islands to enjoy a lasting calm, and finally Aang almost literally had to drag me out the door of the palace in the end, with hasty goodbyes and promises to visit soon.

& that was it, in the blink of an eye five more years had passed us all by. I saw them at least once every year, of course, at the grand ball held in the fire nation to celebrate the end of the war and mourn those lost. They all looked so different. Toph was a grown woman now, my brother was married with child, and Zuko… I didn't know about him. Older, more mature, more… fire lord-y. I wondered how changed I seemed to them.

An old gloom gathered over my heart as I recalled the happiness of the past, but I shoved the feelings down again. They had no place in my life now.

I knew the way to Zuko's study by heart, though I _did_ stop to ask a passing guardsman where he was to be sure. Even now, I was quite well-known in the fire kingdom. I used to be Zuko's escort at the random political gatherings that took place, considering the fact that I'd lived in the palace for nearly a year, and was the only tan-skinned woman likely to be anywhere near the fire nation, I was hard to miss. Before leaving, he bowed and spoke my official title- "Lady Katara."

I just blushed and dismissed him. It was ages since anybody had referred to me as that- usually I was the Avatar's wife, his waterbender. I appreciated the man's sentiment, however.

I knocked on Zuko's door almost timidly, shifting Tenzin in my arms. For a moment I almost believed he wasn't there after all, and was about to turn away to find a maid when I heard it swing open behind me.

"…Katara."

I started and looked up to see him move aside, clad in light robes. His hair was down, barely grazing his shoulders. I almost threw myself around him in happiness. I had missed him greatly, and this had been my sole visit to the Fire Nation ever since Aang had told me it was time to leave. We only ever stayed two nights for the ball, and I never had a chance to speak with him alone. A warm smile spread across my face, but Zuko did not share it. He was standing slightly off to the side, allowing me passage into the study. There was something in his eyes that spoke of distance; because despite the fact that I was right in front of him, he looked through me, into the grand hall behind. My joy faded quickly back into my chest, and I entered the room I had once spent many sleepless nights in with a new solemnness. Where there had once been six chairs, there were now two, not including Zuko's own. My heart sank in a way I couldn't begin to describe.

"Did you get my letter?" I thought it was the only reasonable thing I could think of for him to not have been waiting for me, the message could have gotten lost, or perhaps Aang and I had just outstripped it.

"I did."

".. Oh."

The coldness in his voice stripped me of all me previous eagerness to see him. He made no motion to explain himself, to mutter conciliatory words. No, he had indeed read that letter, and he hadn't cared, that was what he meant. The fire lord cleared his throat, and I looked up from the baby I had been awkwardly studying.

"Tea?"

I paused for a moment before replying. "Sure."

And he had poured it for me without once meeting my eye. I gulped it down greedily, feeling the sear warm my insides.

"So how's Aang?"

"He's doing fine, he just need to…"

"I know."

Of _course_ he did, it was in the letter, along with news of our child. I tried to break the silence that settled again shortly afterward;

"How have you been?"

"Good."

I almost sighed aloud- just these curt answers. Why had he invited me in if he didn't want to have a discussion?

"Tenzin?"

I did perk up at that, a smile blooming on my face. I raised the boy above the desk to let Zuko see him.

"All mine."

Another long pause began. I pursed my lips.

"Has the Fire Nation been enjoying the end of the war?"

"Our economy is making a swift recovery."

"How are your ministers?" I clearly remembered how he used to come back from meetings, flames engulfing his fists as he ripped the crown from his topknot.

"They are fine."

He stopped speaking yet again, and I felt my frustration build. I hadn't come this far to be dismissed as if he didn't want me here, as if I were just a nuisance. In this very room, I had helped him write speeches until the crack of dawn, helped him review documents and balance accounts, wrote letters to every nation's delegates five times. I even got him food when he didn't have the time or will to leave the study, I saw him in his weakest moments of despair.

It was as if none of that had ever happened, and I was now the same to him as I was to everyone else: The Avatar's wife, the figurehead of peace.

I looked up solemnly, about to announce my intent to let him work in solitude, but the first thing I saw was Zuko's hand, specifically, Zuko's ring finger; where it was always bare before, there was now a slim golden band there. I was struck by how natural it seemed, as if it had always been there. My eyes steeled over, and I clutched Tenzin a little bit tighter. He was stirring, as if he could feel my emotions as I did.

"So, you're engaged now?" In those words there was a thin veil of civility. This had bothered me- after all, I clearly remembered that he'd called all the court women "fire-breathing dragon vipers". I swallowed the lump in my throat uneasily.

Zuko stopped writing to look at me directly, for the first time since I'd stepped off Appa's back. "…I am."

I chafed "When is the wedding?"

"Two months from now."

"Who is your bride?"

"Her name is Lady Ming Sun."

Two months from now was the war's end celebration. It meant that Zuko either was going to be married shortly before or shortly after it. It meant that I would be attending, and that he was truly engaged to one of those dragon vipers. The thought made my heart clench in strange ways. I always thought it was unusual that Zuko didn't get married before all of us, considering the fact that he was the only one in great need of an heir. I hadn't dwelled on it then, but now that it happened I found that it hit me with the force of a rhino bull and I didn't know why. I blurted out a question that sounded more like a demand.

"Do you love her?"

Zuko's fist clenched at the same time my own did. Cold steel met with molten gold, sparks flew up in the air.

"She's going to be my wife." His voice was harder than rock, and I felt the words cut me deep in a place I couldn't pin. I stood up abruptly, knocking over my own chair. Tenzin woke up.

"That's not an answer." I seethed with cold fury.

What he would say next made my heart stop, and a feeling ran through me like swallowing ice cubes.

"Did you love Aang?"

My eyes widened, I was utterly speechless. It was a low blow, and he'd known it in the almost regretful way he looked at me. He had undone me in four words that he hadn't dared bring up since that night, and perhaps I would have just stood there in broken stupor had Tenzin not started to cry. I said nothing more before exiting his study, not noticing that the tea in his pot had turned into ice as I left.

A maid found me shortly after, almost in tears, but thankfully not quite yet, and I had been escorted into my rooms.

That's how a master waterbender ended up feeding her infant with a bottle of milk, alone, crying up a storm. I recalled Aang's conversation with me before we had left the air temple.

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><p>"<em>Why do you want to go to the fire nation? Why not stay here? Tenzin is too young to travel so far."<em>

"_Aang, don't be ridiculous, I can't take care of him on my own. What if something happens to me? You could be gone for a month!"_

_He paused in contemplation, and I kept going. "Besides, I haven't seen Zuko since last year. We haven't caught up for a while and he's the only person who stays in one place most of the time." The same could not be said for Toph, who all but vanished off the face of the planet between notes, and Sokka was in the South Pole. Aang was won over, and I had been almost giddy the whole journey to the capitol._

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><p>I thought that I'd be welcomed with open arms, that we'd spend all their time reminiscing about the past and that he'd be overjoyed to be Tenzin's godfather. What had I done to him to be treated like an outsider again? It was true that we hadn't been close in recent years, but he couldn't honestly have held me accountable for that when <em>he<em> stopped writing back! It was unfair; unfair that I didn't even know about his engagement, and unfair that he acted as if we hadn't fought side-by-side against his sister.

"Just what is his problem?" I shouted angrily to my wall. Tenzin didn't seem to mind.

I tucked Tenzin into the small crib they'd provided me with and went to sleep with my head full of questions about the stupid Fire Lord who had become a stranger to me.

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><p>"<em>Zuko." The fire lord looked up, surprise written on his face. "What are you doing out here?"<em>

_He contemplated his answer for a moment, bread in his hand and turtle ducks enjoying a feast. He could not lie to her. "I'm just relaxing."_

"_The great fire lord, _relaxing_? That's a new one."_

"_Hah. I'm not stiff all the time, you know."_

"_I know; it's impossible to be stiff in your sleep, after all." She continued to poke fun at him, but ended up joining him on the stone bench in the end._

"_Why are you still up?"_

"_For the same reason you are." She told him innocently, dipping her bare feet into the pond._

"_You're worried?" That had made her pause and purse her lips._

"_I am- about lots of things."_

_His curiosity was piqued "Like?"_

_She was reluctant to tell him, he read it on her face like how he read a letter. "Just everything, maybe; everyone, but mostly just… Aang."_

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><p>I woke up to the sound of somebody knocking on the door. I was vaguely aware that there were dried tears smattered on my cheeks, and yelled "Just a second!" before rushing off to bend away all traces of yesterday from my face.<p>

To my surprise, it was that very stupid Fire Lord who stood at my door. He glanced at the crib in the corner of the room before looking back to me, with my messy clothes from yesterday and my bed hair. I realized that I must have looked like a train wreck, but couldn't find it in myself to care for appearances.

"Can we… talk?"

He sounded oddly off-key, and I sensed the shadow of an apology in his voice. I couldn't avoid him forever, and it was better to resolve whatever issues we both seemed to have now, right? I nodded, and he led the way. Zuko walked fast in his pointy boots, I had to admit. I struggled to keep up with his pace. I could tell that he was a bit nervous, the way he fiddled with his robe tassels.

The Fire Lord ran a hand through his hair and sighed. "I'm sorry, Katara." He looked over to me and I could see the regret pool in his eyes. "What I said was awful. I just..."

I felt myself shaking my head, but I didn't feel anything. "No. It was none of my business to ask about your… fiancée." I smiled painfully, and saw the same emotion reflected back to me in his face. "After all, I'm not your political advisor anymore." -or your escort, or really anything that belongs in your life. I'm simply your past now.

Nothing else important was said after that. We passed our time with idle chatter until Zuko was called away to a meeting with his ministers, and I returned to my room to take care of Tenzin. Nothing was like how it was before. Not I and certainly not Zuko.

I was right, of course. We really weren't connected the way they were. There was a big, impossible distance that had opened up between us. It was no longer us two, Katara and Zuko, it was the Avatar's waterbender and the Fire Lord, like it was from the beginning. I felt a little rift open up inside me when I understood with a sad certainty that we could never sit in his garden at midnight ever again.

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><p>"<em>What about Aang?"<em>

_The waterbender sighed, wondering where to begin. "He's not right for me. I can tell."_

_Zuko could tell too, but he'd never say that out loud. She continued. "He loves me so much, and I just…"_

"_Don't." He finished for her. She looked hauntingly beautiful in the pale moonlight, and also very sad._

"_What can I do, though? It's not like I have a choice." But she always had a choice; she just wouldn't let herself see him like that. She couldn't possibly love him, nor could she love the air boy she'd saved almost 2 years ago. She had trapped herself with a sense of duty._

"_What about you, Zuko?"_

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><p>A week passed uneventfully. I stayed in my room most of the time, leaving to eat breakfast with the Fire Lord every morning. A week's worth of meaningless chitchat about the weather, the state of the air temple and a dozen other things I could not make myself care for if I tried. On the ninth day, however, there was an addition to our solemn party of two. Zuko cleared his throat as he stood up, clearly not expecting her. As he circled around the table, however, I became increasingly aware of who she really was. When his arm wrapped around her impossibly tiny waist, I knew.<p>

"Katara, meet Ming."

The girl I was being introduced to bowed gently. She had jet black hair, done in an ornate up-do that made me want to reach for my own little hair loopies self-consciously. Ming donned an elaborate looking dress with several layers, the topmost being the colour of coral with a red under-dress peeking out at the collar and sleeves. She wore it with a white silk sash, and generally just looked every bit as Fire Lady as I had expected of Zuko's future wife. Her face was not severe; rather, it was soft and delicate. They both took their seats at the head of the table. She was beautiful, her manners exceptional, and also seemed to be quite intelligent, sometimes asking Zuko about his recent political woes.

I managed to silently suffer through half of my plate before being rescued by a maid who said Tenzin had woken up early and began crying. I tried not to make it look as if I was escaping the room, but it probably seemed that way exactly. Upon leaving, I leaned my back against the cold wood of the wall by the double doors to the dining room. I could hear them talk, doted in places by Zuko's deep laughter and Ming's own lady-like giggle. So that was it then. It may have taken five long years, but Zuko had replaced me with somebody better in every way. I just couldn't _wait_ to see their graceful, pale, amber-eyed children.

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><p>"Shh, Tenzin. Mommy's here." I cooed softly to my child. Large blue eyes stared up at me, brimming with yet unspilled tears. Tenzin had inherited Aang's skin; I didn't know what else, though. I had never been good at picking out which features children inherited from either parent, and I settled myself into assuming that Tenzin would be handsome and kind in the future, and that was all I cared for.<p>

Tenzin must have also been psychic, because he kept saving me when I needed it most; that first day in Zuko's study, and now, too. He was also a very well behaved baby. I read to him with books borrowed from the palace's library, sang him water tribe lullabies, and just passed the days by like that. I did not regret having Tenzin, despite these confused feelings for his father. He gave me a toothless smile, and I couldn't help but put my own feelings aside for a moment to smile back.

I had been horrified the moment I learned that I was pregnant. I knew that it would have to happen eventually, but I was unprepared for it. Aang, typically, was overjoyed, and I pretended to share his feelings as I always did. I wrote letters to everyone, informing them all of the good news. Of everybody I mailed Zuko was the only one who hadn't replied. Now I guess I knew why- it seemed as if he didn't want much to do with me anymore.

Did you know that the air nomads didn't get married? They lived communally at the air temple, which was all well and good until the temples were destroyed a century ago. That's why I didn't have anything to tie me to Aang except for Aang himself, and now Tenzin as well. People still called me the Avatar's wife, though, because it was basically true. Ever since we had left the Fire nation we had been inseparable.

I knew I should have been happy for it; happy to have an attentive husband, happy to travel the world, happy to not have to be alone; but it was always there, that feeling of what I had never being quite enough. If I wasn't with Aang, I could have been in the South Pole, I could have taken over the tribe and let Sokka continue living in Kyoshi with his wife and daughter. Maybe I'd even still be friends with the man who ruled over this palace and the lands surrounding.

I peered down at Tenzin sadly, because I knew that he would never see me truly as happy as I was once. I did love him, of course, but in the last few years I'd forgotten more and more of myself, living only half of what I could be. I sighed and placed the sleepy boy back into his crib before I heard knocking.

It was Zuko. How could it be anyone besides him? I was surprised though. I had honestly expected him to stay with Ming and then go off prancing about the palace grounds like engaged couples often did, but I knew I still wanted to talk to him despite myself. I tried not to look as hopeless as I felt, and plastered a smile on my face before opening the door.

There he was, in all his Fire Lord glory. The scene from a week ago replayed, but as we walked he said nothing. I knew where he was leading me- back to the place we had spent so much time together in the past. I was sneaking away from Aang, and he was forgetting for a few moments the responsibilities that lay on his shoulders. In a way, it was as if we were going back in time.

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><p><em>He stopped to think for a second, eyes looking skyward, toward the stars. He could just say he was worried about the fire nation, an easy exit if there ever was one. She would comfort him; tell him that I knew he'd be a great fire lord. That was just her way, and he never doubted her sincerity in that belief.<em>

"_What would have happened if I'd joined you sooner?"_

_The words slipped out of his mouth without him willing it, and he panicked slightly, peering over to her. She was looking up at the stars as well, instead of giving him the look he thought she'd be giving him._

"_I don't think anything would have changed in the end."_

"_Really?"_

"_Really."_

"_Then would you have still picked the Avatar?"_


	2. Zuko

Starts off as Zuko's perspective and shifts in the middle, and again near the end .

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><p>He had seen the look on her face when the maid had called her away. It destroyed him. Ming kept talking to his right, and he played along, laughing at her small jokes about fire nation politics and trying to seem as if he were not itching to bolt right after the waterbender. She thought she'd hidden her discomfort from him, but he knew her well after all the time they'd spent together in this very room, manoeuvring the tricky politics that surrounded the fire nation's rebuilding efforts. Zuko had caught Katara's eye as she was introduced to Ming. The sudden emptiness in them was nothing short of debilitating. She had to understand why he was going to marry her, but she would also have also 'understood' that Zuko didn't need her anymore. They'd barely talked since she arrived, their only real conversation turning into an argument. His apology hadn't changed very much, because the thing that he'd said was still fresh in both their minds.<p>

He hadn't even needed to think about the question she'd posed to him. He did not love Ming, and he never would. He chose her because there was nobody better that he could pick. He did it out of duty and a lack of time; he chose _her_ because nine months ago Katara had announced that she was pregnant with the Avatar's child. There was nothing else he could do, so he gave in to his council's long-standing demand that he marry and produce an heir. Maybe Katara didn't know exactly why she was upset, but he knew that the feeling of being shattered from the inside out was named _heartbreak_. She could keep denying it all she wanted, but he recognized the look in her eyes very well. He'd made the same face on numerous occasions. The first was when she left his palace with Aang, the second was when she told him she was pregnant with an impersonal letter, and now, after he'd received her most recent correspondence and had to realize that it wasn't just a sick joke played on him by La.

Ming left after breakfast, saying that she had just missed him lately, and that she had to go attend to some other business for now. He nodded, they embraced, and she left.

Zuko had all but sprinted halfway across the palace to Katara's room, stopping for only a moment to wonder if this was really a good idea. Before he'd even made up his mind fully, he was knocking, and he didn't have a chance to catch his breath before she answered the door, fully expecting him, conflicting feelings written all over her.

"Come with me."

And she did.

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><p>"<em>Then would you still have picked the Avatar?"<em>

_Katara was confused, though at the same time she knew exactly what he meant by that question. Her brows knitted together. The look on his face was unreadable. His hands were resting on his lap, and she could see the tension in his knuckles. She wanted badly to reach out and soothe his worries. The waterbender looked directly into his eyes, unfazed by the fierce amber._

"_I told you. I was never able to pick anybody but him."_

_Zuko stood up, and she could feel the anger radiating from him._

"_Yes you can, even now, you can!" He stopped suddenly, sighing. He looked very defeated, and very tired._

_She had known; she was just in denial the whole time. She'd never stop being in denial, and that was why she shoved the way her heart jumped in her ribcage down._

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><p>They stood at the edge of his private garden, the quacking of the turtle ducks filling the silence around them.<p>

Katara started to speak. "Do you remember…?"

"I do." The Fire Lord often relived the secrets they had spoken that night. He turned to look at her, really look, like he'd avoided doing for a week now. He found himself staring at somebody changed. Katara had bags under her eyes, and her face was no longer in perpetual smile-mode. The magnificent blue in her eyes hadn't been diluted, but they no longer reflected her raw emotion like they used too. Of all of the Gaang, time seemed to have hurt the waterbender most. It was strange, because despite their ages she had been taking care of them, and if anything she should have only grown more capable in time.

But years of denial and resistance tended to wear down on a person's spirit. He could see that clear as day, written on the fine lines on her face that hadn't been there before, and the shadow of a frown.

"I'm sorry, Katara."

She lifted her head. "For what?"

He didn't know what he was apologizing for, really. There were too many things. One was not being brave enough to steal her away from a life he knew she wouldn't enjoy, for not writing her back because it hurt him too much to keep imagining her with the Avatar, or for having to wear this stupid golden band on his finger and pretend it was all okay.

Zuko stood frozen, feet rooted to the ground. Regret filled him from head-toe, and a slow grimace lifted up the corners of his mouth.

"I don't know why I took you here."

He threaded his fingers through his hair awkwardly, but never severed the contact they'd established.

Never once did either of their gazes wander, he looked purposefully into the troubled sea of her eyes; he knew that there could be a storm raging in them, or a serene peace in rapid alternation. Katara broke away first, walking past him to the stone bench, underneath the shade of the apple blossom tree. She twirled one of the pale flowers between her fingers contemplatively. She changed the subject.

"So why did you choose to marry Ming after all?"

Zuko decided there was no longer any point in hiding the truth of the matter, not now, when the time they had left was so short. Maybe Katara didn't know it, but Aang had finished his business much earlier than expected, and was on his way back to the fire kingdom. He'd arrive within a day. Zuko felt a sense of déjà vu overwhelm him.

He stared into the distance. "I married her because there wasn't any time left to wait for _you_."

He'd answered without turning around, he didn't have to look to know that she had paused; shocked to hear the words tumble so carelessly out of his mouth. He'd spent six years hiding it, and now there was no more either of them could do to change the course of their lives.

During every celebration, he and Toph pretended not to notice Katara's decline, and every celebration, Zuko had also pretended that he didn't wish with all his heart to see her at his garden like old times. It was impossible, now that she and Aang shared a bedroom. He knew she was unhappy, perhaps deep inside everybody knew except for the great Avatar. She probably thought she was fooling them all with her cheerful laughter and her mothering smile. She was fooling nothing and nobody, except for the person who had never been able to understand her in the first place.

"What do you mean by that?" She replied quietly, when he knew by the sound of her voice that she knew exactly what he'd meant.

* * *

><p><em>Zuko had crushed the bread, there were now crumbs scattered all over the grass in his little garden.<em>

_She was feeling choked up, and she closed her eyes because her vision had gotten blurry._

"_I just… can't. I can't."_

_In her mind's eye, she relived the events of the past year. Seeing Zuko work himself halfway to exhaustion on a regular basis, hearing Zuko doubt every single decision he made, being his solitary shoulder to metaphorically cry upon. She remembered him talking about the spider's web that was politics and how much every meeting drained him. She was shocked again by the numbers he'd recited to her about what the Earth Kingdom wanted in retribution, she was even there every single time his guard captain had reported a new riot to him._

_It had crushed her every inch as much as it crushed him._

* * *

><p>"You know already, Katara." He walked closer to her, voice softer now. "You've always known."<p>

She looked away from him, focusing on the pillar in the corner.

"I don't love you, Zuko."

It was a thinly veiled lie, at best. He wondered if that was what she had been telling herself long enough to think it was true. They both knew.

"You don't have to protect him anymore Katara, he's not _here_."

Zuko said it with the cold of an iceberg in his voice and the edge of a blade.

She got angry; she stood up and faced him, a tempest raging in her eyes. "What makes you think I've just been protecting him this whole time?"

"Don't deny it! Toph noticed, Suki noticed, La knows even Sokka has noticed by now. Do you really think that your closest friends would believe that you were still the same Katara they remembered?"

She shook her head, and Zuko knew she was trying to pretend it away like she had been doing for an age.

"I do love Aang."

"You didn't love him the night before you left this place, and you don't love him now. Nothing has changed, Katara."

He was very quiet for a moment. "Nothing except you." The words came out like broken glass, and every one of them cut his heart. He had finally said what he felt for so long, but it didn't make him feel any better, because Katara's eyes were drifting away once more. There was a tangible pain in his chest, an aching that lay between the shatter and the squeeze.

"Am I supposed to feel like I've made the wrong choice, Zuko? Am I supposed to believe that Tenzin was just a mistake because I was too afraid to tell Aang that I didn't want to go with him five years ago?"

And there it was, the best confession he'd ever get out of her. Zuko knew that the slight waterbender's façade was quietly crashing down around her.

"I never said that, Katara."

She knew that he hadn't and she said it anyway, because those were the doubts that had been lingering in her mind for months.

"Why are you doing this to me now?"

The words were nothing but a whisper on the wind, but Zuko caught them easily.

So many things had been left unsaid for so long, so many loose ends that needed to be tied up neatly. They all needed to move on. That was why he was putting it all out in the open one last time, to let the water wash away everything that they had been too afraid to say. He'd been clinging onto the dream for years, of her by his side, being his Fire Lady, and she'd been running away from that same dream for the same amount of time. Maybe these things should never **be** spoken out loud, but it had eaten at them both from the inside out. They had to meet in the middle instead of perpetually moving apart.

"We both need this." He answered.

* * *

><p><em>He caught the contemplative look in her eyes. It gave him a vague hope, she knew.<em>

_She shouldn't be giving him hope, because she'd always been destined to make little airbender babies with the Avatar. She knew it from the moment they'd met that she wouldn't have a choice. She needed to invest everything she had into him._

_What she found herself feeling for Zuko was dangerous; it would upset the balance they'd worked so hard for. She didn't want to hurt Aang. She didn't want to turn Avatar and Fire Lord against each other._

_The deadline to change her mind had been long ago, when they were still camping at the air temple together- maybe even underneath Ba Sing Se was the deadline. She didn't know._

_He sat down on the bench again, closer than before. Katara didn't back away. They had a connection that couldn't be described. Everything he felt, she felt with him._

_If he loved her, she had to love him back. That had not been a choice either._

* * *

><p>Zuko knew that the past and the present were intertwined, and he tried to avoid it by fighting with her outright, by ignoring her overtures of friendship, but he couldn't avoid it any more than he could avoid the future that would not have her in it. Was it selfish of him to want her for just a brief moment now? Aang could have her for the rest of both their lives if La threw him a bone right now.<p>

"When is he coming back?" She asked, quietly reading his mind.

"… Tomorrow."

She nodded solemnly, and crouched down by the pond, forming a miniature hurricane that lifted a turtle duck out of the water. They were like that for a long time, Fire Lord standing rigid, watching her indecipherable face as she weighed her options against one another.

"What's your opinion of Tenzin?"

Zuko was surprised at her question.

"I think he'll grow up to be strong, because he has you for a mother and an Avatar for a father."

Zuko said the words without any hint of bitterness.

"I think so too. You know, you're also his godfather."

"Really?"

"Aang and I decided that a while ago. Who else could be a godfather, after all? Sokka is already an uncle."

"…It's an honour, really."

There was a long period of silence before the next word was spoken. They had what felt like all the time in world until tomorrow, but they knew that by the time Aang came back the week and a half they had together would feel like no time at all, and they would wonder why they wasted so much of it.

* * *

><p><em>He kissed her, for what would probably be the first, last and only time he would.<em>

_Dawn was fast approaching, and he tasted like spice._

_It felt like an eternity had passed, but in the end they both went back to their rooms to await midday, where Aang would be waiting in the courtyard to take her away from the fire nation._

_Everything in her screamed for her not to leave, not to forget the Fire Lord who'd taught her so much about herself and about the world she lived in. She didn't want __to sever the bond they had, but like it had been said, time and time again, she didn't have any other choice._

* * *

><p>"Maybe I should-"<p>

Zuko cut her off, swiftly and precisely. His lips were softer than the petals of the apple blossoms blooming above them, and she forgot about Aang, forgot about even Tenzin. He was right, of course. The both needed this.

The knot inside her chest gradually unrolled itself, because she could finally admit it now that the cards had been placed before her: She loved Zuko, yet she was tied to Aang. It was just the truth of things. Katara was done lying to herself. Maybe she was selfish for feeling the way she did, but she'd dedicated five years of her life to being everything that Aang wanted in a bride and forgetting everything that made her Katara. She'd spent five years pining for and rejecting Zuko in turn.

His arm curled around her waist, and a tanned hand wound itself up in his hair.

They separated for a moment, golden orbs staring into sea blue. They both understood.

Firebender and waterbender left the garden to tie up their unfinished business, and Katara didn't feel the slightest bit ashamed. She had been ashamed for so long trying to beat back this emotion and pretend it wasn't there. Pretend that she didn't feel like her and Aang's relationship was a mistake.

It was no more a mistake than how she fell in love with Zuko, she knew now.

* * *

><p><em>Aang was waiting for her at the bottom of the steps to the palace. Katara found that she couldn't move, as if her being was bound to the place behind her- or rather, the person beside her.<em>

_She wasn't ready to go. There were things she hadn't said to him that he should probably know._

_But now it was too late._

_Aang was confused at why she didn't move. He climbed up the steps, tugging on her hand._

"_Katara, we need to leave."_

_She felt numb all over, and she strained hard not to turn around to look at Zuko._

_The Fire Lord watched the scene with forced detachment. This is where it ended; this is where their paths would no longer intersect. He kept any emotion off of his face, be it regret or sadness._

"_Katara…" Aang pleaded._

_Zuko frowned, placing his hand on her delicate shoulder. She snapped around immediately. They exchanged a look that nobody would understand, except those that had found love and then lost it._

"_Katara." The Fire Lord said._

_And this time she turned to Aang, smiling. She waved Zuko goodbye and got on the flying bison, and from then on they pretended that nothing had been said, and nothing had been done._

* * *

><p>History had repeated itself, but at least this was the last time.<p>

Katara held Tenzin in her arms, a quiet peace settling over her long stressed features. Just like five years ago, Aang would never know about the things that had been said last night.

"Goodbye, Zuko."

"I'll see you in two months."

And they were off; this time, there was nothing left in the air. The Fire Lord breathed in and felt free, the ring on his finger no longer a ball and chain- the weight she had held over his heart vanished, leaving behind only a ghost of itself.


End file.
